Sarmatian Burials Excavated by Dmytro Berezovets at the Lower Dnieper Basin

Abstract

During the campaigns of 1951 and 1953 Dmytro Berezovets excavated the Sarmatian graves near the Kut, Hrushivka and Marianske villages of Apostolovski district of Dnipropetrovsk region. These materials were published briefly, without typological and chronological definitions and analysis of the historical context, with illustrations of rather low quality. Moreover, there was some confusion and errors later made by some researchers, including the author, which have been replicated with each reference. Therefore, it is worthy to republish these materials from the standpoint of the current level of the Sarmatian studies in order to correct certain errors as well.
 Dmytro Berezovets has discovered the assemblages both of Early Sarmatian (Kut, Hrushivka, Maryanske, barrow 3, grave 4) and Middle Sarmatian Age (Marianske, barroow 5, graves 5—7; barrow 5, grave 6; barrow 6, grave 14) according to traditional chronology. All Sarmatian burials under study were the secondary graves in the Bronze Age mounds and Scythian ones. The skeletons lied supine, with their heads directed to Northern sector. Among the grave goods are the Roman and Sarmatiam pottery, simple bronze adornment, cornelian, jade and glass beads, bronze mirror, bone ritual spoon etc. The Early Sarmatian assemblages discovered by Dmytro Berezovets are dated to the late 2nd—1st century BC, the Middle Sarmatiam ones to the 1st—2nd centuries AD. The identical funeral rite of the graves of different date near Marianske once again confirms the validity of the periodization proposed by me in due time, according to which all the graves under study belong to different phases of the first period (phase A2 — Kut, Hrushivka, Marianske, barrow 3, grave 4; phase B — Marianske, barrow 3, graves 5—7; barrow 5, grave 6; barrow 6, grave 14).